The Shoal

A Literary and Art Journal by e Gifford Street WritersFalmouth High School | 2014-2015

The Shoal

Index

Maddie Scavotto • Cannoli Fest • 1Marcus Dalpe • e Chatham House • 2

Ruth Fuller • People Watching • 3Olivia McKnight • Naked Pages • 5

Meredith Davis • Louis • 6Ashley Estrela • Freshmen Invasion • 7

Elizabeth Taft • 3 a.m. • 9Alyssa Plack • Don’t Cry Wolf • 10Lilly Paine • Strawberry Lillies • 10

James Driscoll • Footsteps • 11Wei-ren Murray • Being • 12

Madi Andrade • e Laughing Gull • 13Emily Wright • Petals • 14

Marisa Dell’Anno and Mattie Madsen • e Great Beetle Argonauts • 15Kaitlin McManus • e End • 16

Jessica Edgar • March • 17Annie Yakovleva • Dreaming Fairy • 18

Tommi Gans • e Simple Life • 19Anna Merryman • Market • 20Rachel Weaver • Equality • 21Mattie Madsen • Flower • 22

Becky Hopkins • He Exists in the Flowers • 23

On the CoverCourage of a Lion by Kendall StoufferKendall is a senior enrolled in AP Art.

She enjoys drawing, painting, and nature.

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Cannoli FestMaddie Scavotto

I am twelve years old; in my prime, and open to all possibilities the future mayhold. I want to be an astronaut, rock-climber, veterinarian, and scuba diver, butsome part of me thinks cooking might be cool too. I don an apron, the blue one myfather brought from home. It is worn from many years of homemade pie-makingturned flour fighting. I tie the ends in a neat bow, grab my tongs, and enter the hotzone.

e most ambitious culinary endeavor of the year occurs in my aunt's kitchenevery December. My extended family gathers for one day to celebrate Cannoli Fest.What better way to honor our Italian heritage than with food?

I man the oil station, dropping each shell into the bubbling vat and monitoringits progress until it achieves a perfect golden color. I carefully remove the tube frominside the hardened shell and examine the finished product for imperfections. Here,the perfectionist and the competitor inside me are at odds. I desperately want to beatlast year's record, but cannot accept mediocre work. If the shell passes inspection Iplace it on top of the steadily mounting pile. is is my favorite responsibility; eachcannoli advances the count, and this year my eyes are set on 750.

ere are, of course, complications during such an intricate process. Casualtiesoccur in the fryer when the heat of the oil is too much for a poorly wrapped shell. Itbursts apart and falls off the tube, rising to the surface like a life boat. I rescue itsolemnly. And sometimes Uncle Paul gets a little too experimental with the recipe (asubstitution of white for red wine can make or break a batch, you know).

I glance back from the stove to inspect each station. We must work efficiently ifwe want to beat last year's record. Little Anthony isn't rolling the dough around themetal tubes tight enough. He's off prep work. Send him to the coolers. He can fetchwaters and sodas for the real workers. His older brother steps in to pick up the slack,but soon, a basketball game starts up in the driveway. ere goes most of the assem-bly line. Traitors.

When Cousin Ally grabs a handful of hot tubes, her sharp cry interrupts theaunts in their gossip. ey drag her to the bathroom for medical attention. I shakemy head as I turn back to the stove. Unforced errors; we're beating ourselves thisyear.

And a constant, disruptive presence to the work-place environment is the groupof "free-loaders" who spend most of their time chit-chatting over Manhattans. eirDean Martin sing-a-longs frequently interrupt our production. ese are the same

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slackers we'll find passed out on the couch for a 5 o'clock nap. Yet despite all of the setbacks, I can't help but smile to myself. How blessed am I

to be part of such a beautifully frustrating, gratifyingly dysfunctional mess? It's whatthe Sicilian ancestors would have wanted, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Maddie is a senior. She loves sports, and plays soccer, hockey, and golf. Some of her inter-ests include reading, television, comedy, and graphics. Next year she will play hockey atSaint Anselm College and study either biology or English.

e Chatham HouseMarcus Dalpe

Marcus is a junior. In his spare time, he enjoys painting, drawing, and playing tennis. His favorite medium is acrylic.

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People WatchingRuth Fuller

is poem was written on a bus ride to Vermont last fall, based on the anonymous woman sitting across from me.

Her shoes are off, her feet on the seat next to her,and her name is Olivia.

She grew up in VermontWith a blue swing in the backyardAnd a father with happy eyesAnd a family tradition of mashed potatoes on Wednesday nightsAnd a favorite color: green.

She began, slowly, to write her every thought in the future tense:Waiting for age sixteen— to drive a car,en age eighteen— to buy cigarettes,en age twenty-one— to drink a beer.

She was movement,And naturally traded substance for skyscrapers without a second thoughtWhen she met a man who called her "Liv",And led her to New York.

Some nights, when she stops spinning,She misses the dew of Burlington in May.

And sometimes, in early morning conversationShe wonders why he keeps calling her "Liv"Like it’s a chore.

But a high school friend called last weeke girl she used to plan her wedding with at middle-school sleepoversAnd she felt obliged to visit.

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Something tells me her husband Doesn't know she's hereOr didn't approveBut she is, and she matches the landscapeFolding in its green.

Here, the back of her eyelidsAlongside the hum of highwayLets her rest like she hasn't since age ten.

And her faintly upturned lip cornersReminds me of the color of dawnJust before sunrise.

Ruth is a junior who watches “Law & Order SVU” with her mom most nights and lis-tens to NPR on the weekends when she isn't waitressing. She hopes to work in the field ofhuman services after high school and has always had a fascination with words. Ruth's fa-vorite time of year is the end of May when the Champlain College Young Writers' Confer-ence is held: three days surrounded by quirky creative geniuses who are barefoot andslamming poetry.

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Naked PagesOlivia McKnight

A writer's strongest weapon is a naked piece of paper.Pen touches paper

andwords escape across the page

desperate hands viciously smear beautiful phrasesevoke passion

erect deepest thoughtswhisper hopes

dauntlessly encourage dreams to unfoldLeft to rightuniform text

that isn't so uniform.

Olivia is a sophomore.

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Louis Meredith Davis

Meredith has two dogs, a Brittany Spaniel named Barney and a Golden Retrievernamed Greta. Louis, a mixed breed, is my friend's dog.

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Freshmen InvasionAshley Estrela

Every fall, a plague sweeps the country. Trapped in its path, high schools are help-less against the arrival of the new freshmen. Top physicists fail to understand thesheer space freshmen occupy: it defies the very laws of nature. e seniors frownupon this intrusion. But have they forgotten they were once gangly, acne riddenfreshmen? After all, seniors also have their flaws.

Freshmen relationships bring disdain to upperclassmen across the nation. TakeCouple A, for example. Let’s call them Freddie and Frannie. ey have dated fortwo days, decided that they are in love, and chosen to show their love through whatI think is making out. But kissing doesn’t even begin to describe the face-suckingthat happens between them. As they stop for air, they stare into each other’s faces asif the slobber covering them is a testament of their love. ey are drooling so muchthat it pools down their shirts. Seniors gag as they walk by while uttering the word“freshmen” and rolling their eyes. Despite their raging hormones, Freddie and Fan-nie's naive love is, in a freshmen kind of way, rather adorable. Freddie and Franniebelieve in high school sweethearts, and in this moment they are completely contentdrinking in (literally) the hope of their future together. ey have yet to be cor-rupted by the knowledge that their relationship will most likely end in flames, andthat their happily-ever-after will be ripped from their chests. So for now, they re-main blissful, cloaked in perfect ignorance.

Seniors are known for their mature relationships, but (gasp) even the royalty hasits faults! By the time April and May roll around, break-up season has begun. TakeSammy and Sally. ey won the award “cutest couple,” but that didn’t stop Sallyfrom dumping Sammy’s sorry behind. Upon hearing news of the breakup, Sally’smom rejoiced, thinking that her teenage daughter freed herself to pursue personaldevelopment. I hate to burst this mom’s bubble, but her perfect little angel wasn’tplanning on using her freedom so purely. Before college, Sally is rushing to get “col-lege experience,” so she can’t be held back by Sammy. Whether it be hooking upwith guy after guy or downing beer, Sally wants to be prepared for the one nightstands and crazy benders she will experience in college. Sure, maybe she has learnedto control her hormones, and no longer melts at the feet of every boy she meets likelittle Frannie does, but Sally is no perfect, mature girl either. She wants to experi-ment, and with these trials come her wild behavior, making her flawed like Frannie.

Groups of freshmen friends huddle together in high school hallways. ey form

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herds to protect themselves from the big bad upperclassmen. On the outskirts of agroup, you can find Frannie, our freshman friend who is one of those sentimentalgirls. You know, the ones who hug their friends at every possible minute because say-ing “hello” simply isn’t enough. She also is a shrieker. Frannie squeals her friends’names so loudly that it has sent six people to the nurse because they made the mis-take of being within a five mile radius of her. Yet, there is something childishly won-derful in her happiness. A friend’s presence is enough to bring a smile to her face. Itnever occurs to Frannie how short her time with her friends is, or that they may bedistanced as they age. As a freshman she naturally perceives only the optimistic sideto her friendships, so she remains stuffed with sunshine, daisies, and all those cheesynouns freshmen use to describe their friendships.

Seniors are less clingy in their friendships. As Sally struts down the hallway shemingles with all seniors from the Regina George imitators to the passive aggressive“nice” people. She seems to accept everyone so much so that teachers often remarkthat “Sally is such a peace builder.” Yay, gold star for Sally! But when mingling withher so-called friends, only one thought remains fixed in her mind—in three monthsI won’t have to see any of these people ever again. Maybe we should take that goldstar back. Sally does not seek shelter in herds of people as Frannie does. Even her flu-idity toward friendships comes speckled with its flaws. Sally is no longer in thathopeful freshman stage that friendships are forever. Rather, she has distanced herselffrom her friends by already looking forward to her future in college. Despite her sta-tus as a senior, Sally is imperfect in her skepticism. Her mature yet cynical aspectsare naturally different than Frannie’s attributes because of their different ages. Sally,of course, is more mature in her outlook on friendship, but Frannie will soon get tothis stage as well. No one stage is better than the other.

Freshmen are often called indecipherable creatures. Yet, just how different arethey from seniors? Aren’t both students developing into more mature individuals?Aren’t both beautifully imperfect? I guess they do vary in their good and bad charac-teristics, so I’ll leave it up to you to decide just how different you think they are. But,maybe we shouldn’t scoff at freshmen couples or groups of freshmen in the hallways.ey may be annoying now, but next year they will join us in our frustration of thenew freshmen class. Similarly, when hipster seniors walk by, we shouldn’t stare toomuch. Even those gods were once geeks.

Ashley is a junior working on being less stressed about English.

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3 a.m.Elizabeth Taft

If only I could harness the feelingsat tug at me in the small hours of the dayPulling at my skin and hair and heartTelling me to go, run, jump, laugh, cry, live.If only I could harness that motivatione motivation to do, to be, to createat only seems to hit at 3 AM.Well, I could have cured cancer by now.Solved world hunger, brought peace to the tumultuous nations of the world.Or at least be able to run a few miles or cook a decent meal.Hell, even this poem was written at 5 AM one summer’s dayWhen I was debating if I should watch the sunrise,Or sleep, as I had appointments to keep the next day.Or well, later that day.e voice inside of me excitedly tells me to go for a run, research that topic,do your hair all fancy and put on make-up because, well, it’s funI plan it all out with growing excitement about the future.en when I simply must sleep,A voice whispers in the back of my mindTelling me that I can’tOr I will never accomplish my goalsI hush the voice, telling it I will carry out all of the plans.Tomorrow. When I wake up.Well my alarm rings much too soon.And I drag myself out of bed with no excitement, throw on the same old jeans andsweatshirt,toss my hair into a haphazard ponytail that I know will slip during the course of theday.And walk out of the house with no make-up on, with no intention of ever going fora run.

Elizabeth is a sophomore who would rather spend all of her time at the dance studio.

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StrawberryLilliesLilly Paine

Lilly is a junior. She partic-ipates in volleyball, dance,softball, band, ceramics,

and art. She is currently inCeramics 2. She is an

honor role student. Lilly en-joys being very involved inthe arts. She also likes to

volunteer for all her schooland church events.

Don’t CryWolf

Alyssa Plack

Alyssa is a senior and willattend the University ofFindlay in August fortraining horses, her fa-vorite thing to do. Shedraws in charcoal and

pencil, and creates sculptures in clay.

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FootstepsJames Driscoll

Footsteps sink and change the land as they create small craters. Accumu-late rapidly among many travelers but seldom gain notice from anyone. Pathsof past and future trail into distant dunes. ey reveal: Tales of stoppingshort, turning back, veering off. Common and sure. Followed, direct. Ques-tioning the destination. White silence says expectation, squinted smirks ofmany. Trek on short, but tired. Shoes fair not in unstable sand: Bare feet andminds. A car. A reminder. A hill, an unknown, its crest like the wave which itowes being.

Winds and time are slowMinds shiver back to safety:

behind the dune-tops

Gentle sea is heard now, harshly, against murmurs of humanity. Behind whis-pers of crashing waves, beyond smells of hope (lunch?)

Against the currentprevailing thoughts subside,

and give way to peace

James is a senior.

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BeingWei-ren Murray

Instinct tells us to shy from the shadows. ere we are vulnerable, disconnectedfrom the comforting familiarity of the world awash with light. We rationalize thatwe fear what may be waiting, lurking in the inky shades. But, in truth, unease stemssimply from the thought of relinquishing control. Our tragedy as human beings isour natural inability to loosen our grip on the reins. And thus we fail to realize theserene beauty of true liberation.

I entered the studio that day unsuspecting of the transformation about to occur.From the threshold my eyes scanned the room for an empty spot on the floor. Withbare feet I padded across the room, acutely aware of the sound my footsteps madeon the wooden planks below. With a single motion I unfurled my mat, cringing as itslapped against the floor, my nose wrinkling at the acrid smell of rubber. I knelt tothe ground, feeling the popping in my knees as I lowered myself to a seated positionand slipped into the meditation.

My gaze fell upon the image of Buddha hanging from the wall in the glare of theoverhead spotlight. With my eyes I traced the contours of his face, following theslope of his nose to the soft curve of his chin. Again and again I rounded that face.As my eyelids grew heavy and began to fall, the sweet features of the distant iconshifted farther and farther out of focus. My lashes swept lower and lower, curtainsdrawing shut bit by bit. And then there was only the soothing stillness of darkness.

My ears latched on to the steady ticking of the metronome. Back and forth itwent, the heartbeat of the room. e individual beats slowly slid together, meltinginto a single drone. Eventually even this subtle sound faded into the background. Iwas enveloped in the tender embrace of silence.

My nose cycled through the waves of breath. Inhale for five, four, three, two, one.Exhale for five, four, three, two, one. Drawing air in. Pushing it out. As time passedinhale and exhale merged together. No longer was I directing my breath. It was au-tonomous, flowing through me of its own accord.

My body rooted into the mat. Consciously I felt the undulations of breath circu-lating throughout my being. With each inhale I could feel my stomach filling withair, my ribs rising, my heart lifting. And with each exhale, my stomach pulling in to-ward my spine, my lungs contracting, my throat closing in. Every minute movementwas part of a carefully calculated formula. But time wore away at the awareness inmy body. First it was my face, then my core, my arms and my legs. Inch by inch Isoftened and pulled away from my body, shedding the burden of my physical exis-

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tence. en I disappeared.My mind left with my body. At the beginning my head was swarming with the

petty details of everyday life. What were my plans for the next hour? e next day?e next week? Assaulting my mind was the nagging anxiety that my life was out ofmy control. But as peace overcame my body, my thoughts slowed to a trickle andthen stopped altogether. Pristine emptiness.

In my breath, I found the ancient Sanskrit word Soham. In my lifetime, I havenever encountered so beautiful a word. “Sooo” is the sound of inhalation, the rush ofair into the body. “Hammm” is the sound of exhalation, the hum of breath leavingthe body. In my meditation, I embodied the word which itself embodies the basis oflife. Translated to English it means “I am” and nothing more. It does not mean to beanything, eliminating our perpetual design to become any one thing or another.

Soham is simply to exist, to accept the breath which flows through the body.Soham is to transcend the mundane pursuits in which we are so rooted. It is only inforsaking the trivialities of this physical world that we can find true contentedness.Only then can we experience true liberation.

Wei-ren is a junior.

e Laughing GullMadi AndradeMadi is a junior.

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PetalsEmily Wright

Emily is a sophomore and has been interested in the arts as well as music since she was little.

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e Great Beetle ArgonautsMarisa Dell’Anno and Mattie Madsen

32 beetles all in my small pocket32 beetles sent far in a rocket32 beetles sweggin out on the moon32 beetles will we see you soon? 32 beetles with 46 friends 32 beetleswill be there till the end.

Marisa is a sophomore who enjoys retweeting and playing soccer and lacrosse. She can eatmore raspberries than you and her favorite book is It by Stephen King.

Mattie enjoys long walks on the beach, viewing sunsets, and dropping fire mixtapes. Her ideal date would be April 25th. It's not too hot, and not too cold. All you need is a light jacket.

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e EndKaitlin McManus

“Have you ever thought about death and dyingAnd running out of time? Of midnight and darknessAnd falling far from dawn? Or what of broken dreamsand flailing hope, do those oftenCross your mind?Do you dwell on faults and flawsAnd saying the wrong goodbyes?Tell me, my son, do the monsters Come at night?”e little boy glanced upwards, Laughing in the face of the questioningOld man. Brazen and learned he pulled himself Onto the ancient lap, turning his bright eyesTo the wrinkled face.“Well tell me mister, what good is that,When there is sunlight to be chased?When there are hopes to be had and jokes to be toldand life to be lived all on its own?What of each hug and kissand wish for everlasting love?Do you forget how to smile and laughAnd dance to your heart’s delight?Tell me, dear sir, how there can be darkness, When Heaven is always light?”

Kaitlin is a junior.

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MarchJessica Edgar

March is like twilight.e time when you don’t know whether to turn the lights on or offthe time when your eyes take too long to adjust to the enclosing darknessthe time when you look around and see blurred forms moving, encircling, disappear-ing.It’s the in between time when the uncomfortable questions set in.e time when you look at your hand and it is not your own.It is blurred by what you think you see and what isn’t really there.Night approaches and new possibilities disappear.Daytime dwindles.When a few confused birds fly past the bare trees to make nests and a crocus tries tomake its start on the hardened earth.

But then, within the dark recesses of night, the wind turns cold, and the water in thegutters turns to ice and the new leaves shrivel and turn themselves back to theground that made them and the clouds descend, an encroaching predator, and thatconfusion sets in, one like a dizziness. e few snowflakes fall and then melt on thehard earth. She is disturbed—the porcelain flakes wandering down to find a placethat cannot hold them, cannot fit them gently in her recesses. e crocus is notcomforted, it is alone in the haze of twilight.When the sun sets and it is easy to stare at.e sun that is supposed to blind has a distance unknown during times of clarity.It seems farther away as the cars drive by and the moon rises only to find its ownconfusion mingling with the stars.

When the streets are emptier than usual. When the street lamps turn on and youdon’t notice the exact moment, but become aware of their presence. When theblurred forms rush past and mingle with what you want to be and have to do anddeem necessary. When a man who sits alone at a table in the cafe on the corner hashis own story. His breath fogs up the window, his eyes stare out, empty—not sure ifhe is seeing or thinking or thinking what he wants to see. Dazed, glazed, you stareback. You find not your own purpose, forget why the shoes were tied so tightly andthe face scrubbed so harshly. His eyes meet your own and the world feels like a

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swirling mass wound tightly and then let go—streaming particles let loose into thehaze of the darkening sky.You turn, walk the other way.ere is a purpose.

Waking up in the morning, there is a purpose for why you tie your shoes so tightly,why your eyes must open to see what could be construed as confusion or clarity.Why there are taxis and street lamps and cold frozen gutters. Why the water thatrushes through has its own destination, but at that instant is stopped in time. Whythe people push by and the cars snake through crowded streets and why buildings fillwith people. Why the world must change and turn and live and breathe.

But not in March.Not at twilight.

Jessica is a senior. In addition to ceramics, she loves music especially classical voice andpiano. She will attend Columbia University and hopes to pursue neuroscience.

Dreaming Fairy Annie Yakovleva

Annie has been sculpting and pursuing art as a hobbysince she was a young child.

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e Simple LifeTommi Gans

For my entire life I have taken the beach for granted. I can view it from my bed-room window. I can walk along it on a cool fall day, and it is the last image I see inmy rearview mirror when I drive away to school each morning. Most summer dayswill find me there, either on a blanket in the sun or at my job as a beach parking lotattendant.

I am seventeen, and ever since I was very young it had puzzled me why touristsventured here to Falmouth for vacations, just to go to the beach. I didn't understandthe amusement in the face of a middle-aged man tossing rocks into the ocean withhis son, watching as most of the pebbles did not skip but rather plopped into thewater. e rest of his family sat shaded by a large umbrella and loudly chit-chattedabout the fact that they were at the country’s edge. It seemed no big deal to me.

At my job, I meet tourists and summer people, children and parents, locals andolder retirees, all of whom have come to Cape Cod as a summer escape. ere’s theninety-year-old woman with the Louis Vuitton hat who secretly conceals her littleShih Tzu in a Coach designer bag, the man with Alzheimers we call "e Captain,"whose wife constantly fusses over him as she leads him to his beach chair, and thewoman I knew as the crossing guard at my elementary school who sits in the sand allday long.

And there is one other man. He must have been at least eighty years old, and hearrived one day in mid-July and all the days after, as I sat for hours bearing the heatof the hottest weeks and the boredom of the job’s long hours. He didn’t have a beachsticker, which is required for parking, but he claimed all he wanted was fifteen min-utes. I was hesitant at first to let him park, but it was a slow day, so hot that peopledidn’t even want to come to the beach.

He always kept to his word, staying only fifteen minutes, and all he did was lookat the ocean from his car. He never got out. After a couple of weeks, he pulled up tomy booth as he was leaving the lot, and he told me how much he appreciated that Iallowed him in each day. He said he has a personal nurse at home and will likelysoon be placed in a nursing home. Because of his poor health, he is only allowed toleave the house for a few minutes. He comes down the street to the beach, just to seethe beauty of the sea.

He began to put in perspective for me the idea that to most, the beach is a lux-ury. e pure majesty of the waves, the sky, and the fact that he was at the edge of

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Market Anna Merryman

Anna took a Cambridge IGCSE course in art. She especially loves outside scenes,portraiture, and still life compositions, and has received some awards,

particularly with her watercolor scenes.

the continent was all he needed to bring himself peace. I envied the simplicity of hishappiness.

I used to tell Mom I wanted to be a retired old woman because it always seemslike retired people have no stress; they always appear content. Now I see that it is aperspective they have, that simple happiness is what they seek. ey don't just see abody of water. ey see beauty in the lapping of the waves and the wonder of thehorizon, far from the chaos and tensions of the rest of the world. And now I see it,too.

Tommi is a senior and will attend Smith College in the fall.

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EqualityRachel Weaver

is poem is inspired by the Ferguson protests.

I don’t desire muchOnly equalityA concept I am promised by those who govern me“YOU ARE HUMAN” they scream at me as though I’ve forgottenI want peaceI don’t want to be scared walking down my streetAnd it’s not the hooded figure haunting me in my dreamsIt’s the man with the power and the gunat’s pointed right at meI sit in protestWith my morals right beside meAnd as I strive to make a changeIt’s clear my voice is lost in the wind that flows between the Man’s earsIf I were black? Would I be shot for screamingIf I were a man? Would my voice be heardIf I were straight? Would my passion be recognizedBorn in a country of differences there seems to be a lot of the same hate occurring.

Rachel is a senior.

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FlowerMattie Madsen

Mattie is a sophomore.

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He Exists in the FlowersBecky Hopkins

When I see a person sleeping, I do not assume that they are dead. I see the gentleexpulsion and inhalation of air and the rolling of eyes resting under eyelids. eheart beats at a slow and even pace, and though it is not audible, the constant move-ment of the life-giving organ is felt by the observer. Why, then, do old ladies croonover the corpse of a dead man in his casket about how it all seems just like he’s sleep-ing? Dead people look like dead people, and yet the mortician dresses the limp limbsin a suit just to put them in a box to be swallowed by the earth.

My mother made me kneel at the open casket. She wanted me to show respect.e idea disturbed me. e body was too stiff, too white. I could see holes in the fin-gers, unhealed after countless pricks to draw blood. I could see the stiff and unnatu-ral placement of the limbs. I could see the makeup applied to give life to the palefeatures. My mother wanted me to show respect to a prettied mass of carbon, hydro-gen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulphur.

But I submitted to her desires and kneeled to the side of the coffin. I hadwatched people go before me, and it looked as if they had prayed over it, so I foldedmy hands, bowed my head, and mouthed the “Our Father” to myself. My mind wasnot with God, though. It was with the version of my grandfather whom I remem-bered and loved, not this corpse in front of me. I did not see him in the body so Idiscreetly raised my eyes to where I knew I could find him.

I knew he existed in the flowers. I imagined his spirit in this room, wandering and wondering where to reside, and

that spirit would not choose the broken body. He would choose the lilacs that hungover the face so close to the nose it seemed they were aching to be sniffed. He wouldchoose the quiet blue-purple hydrangeas in the corner which gazed upon the emo-tions in the room with sympathy and understanding in the little flower faces. Hy-drangeas were Grandpa’s favorite. e spirit I knew was in them touched me a littleand coaxed me away from the coffin to the bright air of the spring morning thatheld more of my grandfather than that body ever could.

Becky is a junior.

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The Shoal

StaffSenior EditorDan Morrison

Gifford Street Writers

AdvisorBarbara Stephens, MFA, English Department

Special thanks toThe FHS English Department; the FHS Art Department;

VIPS volunteer Jayne M. Iafrate; and Carlson Printing.

JoJo BrennanNell ByrneJessie EdgarRuth Fuller

Becky HopkinsAnna Merryman

Elizabeth TaftRachel Weaver

A shoal is a shallow nutrient-rich refuge in a body of water. Whilethe shoal can beach the greatest of ships, it also can nurture the

smallest of the ocean’s creatures. The Gifford Street Writers is like-wise a place where we find nourishment in the company of our

peers. The Shoal showcases our haven and growth in the life of artistsand writers at Falmouth High School.

The Gifford Street WritersFalmouth High School

874 Gifford StreetFalmouth, MA 02540